SA Blog Awards – My 2c
I haven’t had much to say about the South African Blog Awards this year, mostly because it seems apparent that anyone who associates themselves with the damn things gets lambasted by all and sundry in a matter of nanoseconds. Bottom line – in SA facilitating the blog awards is like coaching the Springboks – not a popular job.
Sure, the process of organising and executing these things is bound to have it’s flaws, but in my experience (having got burned by being very involved last year) it’s generally people who have little to no investment in the community that complain the most. Why is it important to invest in the community of blogging as a blogger you ask? Because that’s the essence of blogging, especially in a place like South Africa where the blogosphere is 1. smaller than we think it is and 2. potentially life-changing.
Life-changing!? Aren’t you being a bit melodramatic Mike? Aren’t blogs about bored, socially-insignificant people finding some way – any way – of getting attention from other socially-insignificant people?
Well, sometimes yes. Some blogs really are useless crap. In fact. I think most blogs are useless crap or all-out spam. But I’ve also seen the blogosphere transform people. Take a guy like Dave Duarte, who through his blog and the community of bloggers went from an ‘ordinary’ employee to a speaker-and-educator-in-demand at South Africa’s leading business institutions. Look at Tertia Albertyn, who has helped thousands of couples around the world make some sense of the intense pain of infertility. How about Justin Hartman who (and I hope he won’t mind me saying this) not so long ago wondered if he’d be able to get a job. Now he’s one of the hottest properties and minds in the Web space in South Africa. The list goes on.
If the 2008 South African Blog Awards showcases some of these extraordinary people then it’s a good thing. And who cares if it’s the usual suspects? If you feel like there’s a blogging elite in South Africa that gets the same awards every year over and over again welcome to reality. Try getting off your butt and getting noticed. When I started blogging less than three years ago I was a nobody. I worked flippin’ hard to get noticed through (I hope) good content and investment in the community around me.
So if you have a problem with the blog awards, ask yourself what you’re doing to make them better before you shout your mouth off.
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by Eric says » Best SA Business Blog Nomination
on 06. Mar, 2008
Ordinary employee my ass, LOL!
Dave’s never been that Mike. Perhaps in as much as you were an “ordinary” salesman.
With an array of different entrepreneurial ventures that he was running concurrently, organising events & doing NPO work , he was hardly just the lucky recipient of the kiss of fortune from the blog gods. It’s simply a catalyst to crank the volume up on what you do, not the holy grail.
by Maximillian Kaizen
on 07. Mar, 2008
[...] list by clicking here. Thanks for stopping by.I feel quite bad about doing this seeing as Mike just used me as an example in his SA Blog Awards post but I have some burning issues which need to [...]
by SA Blog Awards, WTF? by Justin Hartman
on 07. Mar, 2008
Well said Mike. It’s so easy for people to spend 5 minutes typing out a moan about what’s wrong with the awards, while the organisers spend literally hundreds of unpaid hours, and naturally fail to please everyone (has that ever been done, anywhere?). Much of the feedback that was generated last year was used to change the structure for this year, and of course those changes are being criticised by new voices.
Being an organiser is less than a thankless task – it’s flame-inducing suicide wish.
I look forward to seeing what happens next year. The “usual suspects” probably won’t be involved in the organising.
by Andrew Smith
on 07. Mar, 2008
Well said, Mike.
by Matt
on 07. Mar, 2008
@Max – ok, maybe you missed that I was giving Dave (and the power of community) and not blogging itself the compliment. Dave would have been perceived by many, as I was, as ‘ordinary’, regardless of what potential he had or didn’t have. And I was just an ordinary salesman, with an ordinary salary and no entrepreneurial anythings on the side – perhaps that makes him significantly different to me – I don’t think so. Bottom line, the medium of blogging has made an unmistakable impact on both our lives.
by Mike
on 07. Mar, 2008
A few valid comments. I do find that there appears an “elitist” group that think it is there responsibility to block all new coming bloggers. The fact some of these kids should be home in nappies and tucked into bed at 19h30 makes it all the more infuriating.
by Wade Balsdon
on 08. Mar, 2008
@Wade not sure if you will read this comment, but I’d be interested to know what led to your conclusion about the elitist group? What examples of blocking new bloggers have you seen?
by Andrew Smith
on 10. Mar, 2008